Katherine shoved the boy away and Mirai shoved Elwin in an opposite direction, and several Torch Bearers punched the earth into a wall, but it was too late – the yellow column of the firework hit the antennae of the machine and cleaved the receiver in two, and bouncing into the arena wall on the opposite end, rolled and exploded into a thousand flecks, peppering the quiet night with a cacophony of crackles.
Robert's team heard it first; followed by Daphne, the Padishahs atop the Tree, then Lucian, and finally Isaac.
Isaac sputtered into his armonion machine as fast he could.
"HQ to Trident North. HQ to Trident North! Elwin, Elwin, do you hear me?"
Nothing.
"Isaac to Elwin, do you copy?"
No response.
With the first throw of the dice, Trident North's armonion machine had been broken.
And to top it off, something caught Isaac and Khan's attention – from afar, heading south through the eastern lane, were numerous firelights waving in the night, scalding the mist. Isaac stood up like a spring and did a count as fast as he could – and to his utmost dismay, the lights numbered nearly sixty.
They were heading in the direction of the southern quartier; they moved and galloped with thundering fury with no sign of slowdown. Both Isaac and Khan's faces twisted in shattered expectation.
This was the Padishah plan all along. By luring the Celendirs with a portent of quiet, they were secretly pooling themselves into an enormous spearhead to attack the flag in the southern quartier, the most heavily defended one; and after that, they would swerve back to capture the flags from House SUNNA and the Circuleum. All they would need to do then would be to return to House ARTAIA to score their decisive victory.
This was where the 3 squadras and 4 that Daphne reported were indeed going; they must have been joined by 3 more squadras which Daphne could not see.
Rafia's defending force in Fort South numbered only 3 squadras.
The Padishahs were attacking with 15.
Isaac almost ripped the talkie-cone from its handle.
"HQ TO FORT SOUTH, HQ TO FORT SOUTH, 15 PADISHAH SQUADRAS ARE HEADED YOUR WAY! PREPARE TO ENGAGE!"
"15 SQUADRAS?" blared Rafia's voice. "GOT IT. ALL HANDS, PREPARE TO DEFEND! WE AIN'T LETTING THIS FLAG UP UNTIL WE DIE!" she blared, the line cutting with a wisp.
Khan looked worriedly at Isaac. "We aren't going to reinforce them? Isaac, there's no way Rafia's 3 squadras survives against 15!"
"You're right, we have to send someone back there –"
Lucian's voice blared over the bell-cone.
"Trident West to HQ. I hear you. If Fort South is being attacked, we can't afford to wait. We must attack now and get the flags before they do!"
***
At the same time Isaac spotted the Padishahs' assault, Elwin's Trident North extracted surrender from the two Padishah squadras, lest they fight until grave injury. White sashes were put over their sashes of gold, rendering them non-combatants for the rest of the battle – they were forbidden to move or speak to their former allies. Thankfully, they did not have to use a red sash on any nor fire off a blue firework, which would have brought down medics waiting aboard the professors' skycraft.
Elwin tried speaking into the talkie-cone of his broken machine to no avail. All he could hear was a monotonous fizz.
"Of course, the very first skirmish we fight just has to break it," swore Elwin under his breath.
"There's no time to linger," cajoled Katherine. "Every second we waste, those at the summit and at the Tree can reinforce."
With the line of knowledge and communications cut with Isaac, he had to make a choice whether to attack or withdraw.
Isaac, on the same beat, was about to unholster his talkie-cone, calculations cascading through his head. The fate of Trident North was uncertain. If he gave the order now, he would commit them all to offense, which could not be easily withdrawn. Elwin's machine was broken. There was no guarantee that Elwin would decide to attack on his own. At the same time, he had faith in Elwin and Katherine and Mirai. Moreover, if the Padishahs had indeed pooled 15 of their squadras for assault, that meant only 5 squadras were spread over the defense. They had more than enough to capture those flags.
Speed was key here – he could order all of them to attack and pray that Elwin do the same, and they would get the 3 flags and return to the ziggurat as fast as possible, before the Padishahs did. After all, the Padishahs were still on their way, while they the Celendirs were at the Padishahs' doorstep.
Isaac's thoughts distilled into a single drop.
"HQ to all Tridents. Attack!"
"About time," Lucian muttered under his breath, as he notified his acknowledgment. Without hesitation he signaled his squadra and two others to leap over the dim temple pediments of House MANASURA, and was racing through when –
A single drop of water hit Lucian's hair, a drop of water which shouldn't have fallen where he walked.
"FROM ABOVE!"
Lucian yelled as he drew a scythe of frost from the mist mid-air, catching the first of the Padishahs to drop from above, throwing him into a wall. Seven Padishahs dropped from the ceiling, one after the other – Lucian barely dodged out of the way as he saw one of his compatriots receive a falling Padishah straight on their shoulders, crumpling, and another was struck in the back; yet another was about to receive a hail the size of a cantaloupe straight in their face, but Lucian caught with a whip and flung out of the way; she nodded thanks to Lucian as they gathered together amidst death from above.
"CASSIUS, WE NEED SOUND!" hollered Lucian, covering his ears, as did all of his allies at the mention of his words –
"FURA, AMPARA!" Cassius bellowed, amplifying his voice into a thunderous roar that sped forward, temporarily suspending every droplet of water in the mist. The Padishahs held their ears in pained shocks; without wasting a moment, Lucian pulled into being his signature whip of water and lassoed three Padishahs and threw them into a wall just as he did to the training dummy many months before; but two Padishahs advanced on Lucian from the side and hit him squarely in the hip with a kick from the dancephrase in the Sparks, nearly breaking the armonion machine and keeling him over; another tried to drive a spear of frost into the machine, but Rayo had darted to Lucian's side, and vaporized the spear into steam as it was about to be driven into its frame – Claudia ripped the tiles of basalt and hurled them like frisbees to the moving shapes of the Padishahs, striking one and missing another.
A white firework rose from the villas and pierced the sky, bursting in brilliant magniton flame for all to see.
"Gather, GATHER!" Lucian roared, darting his eyes back to the battle, seeing in quick glance that 4 of his allies had fallen from the ambush – they only had 8 to spare. The Padishahs, squaring off, had five. He cracked his neck and spat on the earth, and launched himself straight into them all without warning, pulling out two whips of lustrous water from his side; he dodged a blow of a basalt club from a Padishah, ducked underneath another's kick, and grabbing a hold of both of their waists, lifted them and tried to pummel them into the floor – but their own Artillery Guardians had cut the whip, and spewed forth a blast of fire in Lucian's direction; it was blocked by Cassius, who deflected it off with 'ZAHN' to the side to crash into a wall, and Lucian, taking his chance, froze the remains of water in his hands to long katars, swinging like a tornado. Claudia raised a mound of basalt on a Padishah, and Lucian sliced clean the straps of their Quan; another Padishah yelled 'URA!' at Claudia, knocking her off her feet to strike her down with 'UTUN!', but Rayo blasted fire in front of his face as he uttered the second command, distorting the sound and nullifying it. In a coordination too marvelous to behold, the Tide Controllers of the Celendirs drew up crescent blades of frost; in lockstep with their minds, the Eagle Watchers together commanded 'FURA!' as loudly as they could, sending the blades to the astonished Padishahs; before the Padishahs could find time for a riposte, the Artillery Guardians of Lucian's teams had knocked them over with their Dance of the Sparks, and the Torch Bearers, Lucian included, drove gauntlets of earth, fire, and frost into the bellies of their enemies.
Though they had taken Lucian by surprise, they could not stand toe-to-toe with Lucian's compadres.
"Sneaky bastards," spat Lucian, rounding his arm, as the last Padishah crumpled in front of him. "We'll give 'em sashes later. Take the flag!"
"HOORAH!" they yelled, victorious through the ambush.
From away, Isaac saw a firework of white streak hundreds of feet up from House MANASURA and blast apart – soon followed by a firework of white from the east where Robert and his Trident East should have been.
Elwin saw the two white fireworks going off, and surmised at once that it was a signal from the Padishahs to alert they were under attack; without missing a beat, he rallied his Trident North to attack the summit. So Isaac went ahead with the attack, Elwin thought, smiling at the fact that Isaac had faith in his abilities.
They leapt over the arena walls and jumped into the clearing, the outlines of its trees so familiar to Elwin – and came across an unwelcome sight. The defenders had carved stakes of wood and impaled them upon the bottom of the hill, making it a challenge to cleave through to get to the forested pathways; Elwin made out a silhouette of a dozen figures atop, hurriedly moving this way and that, and judging by the smell, flooding the wide stairways was slippery naphtha-oil. It was going to be nigh-impossible to climb without slipping, especially when the defenders at the top were going to hurl rocks and perhaps boulders at them.
But Elwin knew that the summit had no boulders, and it was all soil. They could only throw stones.
"Katherine," said Elwin, turning to her instantly, "can you set fire to the oil?"
"I can, but it'll be a sea of fire."
"Can you part the flames while they roar? Your Maht is Taha, after all."
"I think I – I can. I can. But the woods –"
"The mist is thick and the oil spread too thin. It won't become an image of Narak."
"Everyone, crane your ears," declared Elwin, giving his five squadras a look of utmost assurance, the expression on his face the very same he had when he climbed that summit for the very first time. "As soon as Katherine sets the stairs alight, she's going to part the flames. We will run through the little gaps in the fire, and duck into the woods on either side of the stairs. The Padishahs will think that we will run up the steps and throw stones down at us; but what they don't know is that there are hidden footpaths on the way to the summit. The mists will conceal us. Half of you will follow my lead, and the other half Katherine."
Eighteen heads nodded simultaneously. It was a blessing that none of them were seriously harmed during the skirmish just a moment before.
"Ready?"
"Ready."
Elwin gave his five squadras a signal to divide into two columns as Katherine snapped her finger, sparks shooting from the tips.
The entire stairway at the root came alight in glorious fire; it raced in a furious roar, following the oil to the top, blasting the defenders in surprise.
"NOW!" Elwin roared, as Katherine parted the flame with the rest of the Artillery Guardians, and Torch Bearers with their makeshift shields of earth raced up ahead to shield those behind. Elwin followed in suit.
"SPLIT NOW! SPLIT NOW!" he yelled, as ten of his compatriots launched themselves to the footpath by the left of the stairways, and the other eight to the right – numerous stones and shaved sticks split the fire, having been thrown down, but all of Trident North was safely out of harm's way. Without wasting a moment, the fire still roaring to their side, Elwin signaled them up, up, and up – though it was not the stairs he climbed, the shape of the hill and the feel of its terrain was just as he remembered. He huffed and helped others up, and split the low-hanging branches apart with frost from his Quan. They rushed around the trees and ducked around the brambles, concealing their noise in the crackles of fire and smoke that was beginning to subside.
A red firework cleaved the sky in the direction of House MANASURA. Did it mean that Lucian captured the flag?